String Restriction and Transformation
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Conference centers sometimes trim strings. String comparison is sometimes case-sensitive and sometimes case-insensitive. This section specifies the details of how the API treats strings. It also discusses how the behaviors of the Live Meeting user interface affects interoperability.
General Character Restrictions for All API Strings
A Live Meeting service client must conform to the following guidelines in order to create valid API request messages. All read/write string options and element attribute values are restricted to these characters.
Restricted characters
The following characters must not be in any string values within Live Meeting requests.
White space characters
Newline character
carriage return character
Allowed characters
A client can use any of the following character values in a string sent to a Live Meeting server within an XML request.
a through z
A through Z
0 through 9
Special characters: * [ ].@ - _ ' ! # $ % & + / = ? ^ { | } ~ ` . Note that User IDs and Group IDs further restrict the use of special characters.
Trimming
Create and modify operations contain strings that are stored and later retrieved by other operations. Such strings can be given as attributes or as the contents of leaf elements. Trailing spaces in such string values are automatically removed when the values are stored.
User IDs
User ID string lengths are in the range 1-64 characters. Only ASCII characters are permitted. User IDs cannot contain the characters comma, semicolon, tab, backslash, newline, percent sign (%), less than sign (<), greater than sign (>), or asterisk (*). Trailing spaces are trimmed. Case is preserved. Comparison is case-insensitive. For example, a CreateUser operation can be given a userID attribute of "Smith " (with two trailing spaces). The actual user ID created would be "Smith" with no trailing spaces. An attempt to create a user with the ID "smith" fails because of the case-insensitive comparison.
Group IDs
Everything said about user IDs applies to group IDs. The group IDs Xxxadministrators and Xxxorganizers are reserved and cannot be used in any request.
Meeting and Recording Names
Meeting and recording name string lengths are in the range 1-32 characters. Only letters, digits, spaces, and the following characters are allowed: (+), (-), (_), (=), (/), (#), (%), (*), and (.). The only letters allowed are the English A-Z and a-z. The only digits are the ISO Latin-1 digits 0-9. Leading and trailing spaces are prohibited. Case is preserved. Comparison is not case-sensitive.
User Passwords
User password string lengths are in the range of 1-64 characters. Only ASCII characters are permitted. Trailing spaces are not trimmed. Case is preserved. Comparison is case-sensitive. It is the responsibility of API client software to enforce any restrictions on passwords necessary to achieve the desired level of security.
Meeting Passwords
Meeting password string lengths are in the range of 1-64 characters. Only ASCII characters are permitted. Trailing spaces are trimmed. Case is preserved. Comparison is case-sensitive.
The best practices recommendation is to not use leading or trailing spaces in user IDs, user passwords, meeting names (meeting ID), or meeting passwords (meeting key). For more information about leading or trailing spaces, see Best Practices.
E-mail Addresses
The following characters are allowed in an e-mail address string field:
a through z
A through Z
0 through 9
Special characters: * [ ].@ - _ ' ! # $ % & + / = ? ^ { | } ~ `
Live Meeting User Interface Considerations
The Office Live Meeting user interface transforms strings in some ways that are significant if your users ever use it for management, as opposed to attending meetings. The transformations are also significant if your users log on to meetings that use access control lists. The following transformations are performed:
Strings are trimmed. The effect of the trim is to remove all ASCII control characters, including white space, from the beginning and end of the string. In particular, if you use the Office Live Meeting service user interface to create the users who make API requests, their user IDs and passwords are trimmed.
User and group IDs are converted to lowercase. Meeting names, user passwords, and meeting passwords are not converted.
In meeting names and meeting passwords, sequences of two or more white-space characters are converted into exactly a one space character.
To avoid interoperability problems between the API and the Live Meeting user interface, adhere to the following restrictions:
Do not allow uppercase characters in user or group IDs.
Do not allow user IDs, group IDs, meeting names, user passwords, or meeting passwords to begin or end with white space or control characters.
Do not allow sequences of two or more white-space characters in meeting names and meeting passwords.
General User Interface Considerations
In addition to meeting names and meeting passwords, you should not allow sequences of two or more white-space characters in user IDs and group IDs. It is difficult to distinguish sequences of two or more white-space characters from a single white-space character, especially when a variable-width font is used.